Anna Daniels
Speaking to Harper’s Bazaar for a profile on Florence Pugh, “Black Widow” co-star Scarlett Johansson recounted the moment she knew Pugh was meant to be a star. It’s a moment that just so happens to have taken place while they were strapped to a pole suspended at skyscraper heights. Johansson recounts that before the director yelled, “Action!” Pugh would be nonplussed by the terrifying situation, simply chatting about dates she’d been on recently. “Two seconds later, we were just connected to each other, hanging on by this thread for life,” Johansson says. “I was like, this person is just absolutely…she just has it. She’s so keyed in. It’s an emotional availability. It’s a really rare quality, and it’s the star quality she has.”
Johansson recounted how different her early days in Hollywood were compared to Pugh’s. Times have changed for a young woman in the business, making Pugh a perfect star for the present in Johansson’s eyes. “Why I think she represents her generation in such an iconic way is that she really is in her own skin. She’s incredibly grounded, but she’s also just so self-assured,” the “Jojo Rabbit” star mused. “I was not self-possessed in that same way when I was in my early to mid-20s. I still was growing up in the industry in that time when you had to be really pandering in order to be accepted. And she doesn’t have any of that at all. She’s unapologetically herself.”
With yet-unannounced MCU projects surely on the way for Pugh, the next chapter in her career will unfold next month with “Don’t Worry Darling,” a psychological thriller in which she plays a housewife trapped in an eerily paradisiac 1950s town alongside Harry Styles as her husband. The film opens in theaters on September 23.
Written by: Looper
